REFLECTING THE WAVE, NOT THE TITLE: Increasing self-awareness and transparency of authentic leadership through online graduate student leadership programming

Today’s graduate education should provide students with technical specialization and professional skills to holistically prepare them as genuine leaders, ready to address today’s complex and ethical dilemmas in the workplace. Inclusion of professional development complements their technical specialty by providing opportunities to develop successful, self-aware, authentic leadership within their fields. One way to develop these skills is through an interdisciplinary, online leadership development course. This study examines the effectiveness of an online leadership course in building authentic leadership skills over five academic semesters. Scores on the authentic leadership measure show statistical significance between the pre- and post-tests, with positive effect sizes in transparency and self-awareness. Results suggest that this online course, focused on personal and professional development, improves students’ understanding of themselves and the world around them and capacity to gain the trust of their followers.